What Mimi Thinks
by KissTheBoy7
Summary: Mimi is the only one that knows what's her life is really like. Mimi knows a lot of things. But between the alcohol and the heroin, it doesn't really matter. Oneshot, Mimicentric and heavy on the angst. R&R!


**A/N: This was, once again, one of those pesky ideas floating around that found its way into a notebook and I decided I'm posting it now. Hope you like! First time doing Mimicentric. :D Enjoyyy!**

**Disclaimer: RENT isn't mine, so obviously Mimi isn't.**

**What Mimi Thinks**

Roger is an idiot if he things that she went with Benny because she wanted to. She storms into her apartment after another explosive argument and flings her keys at the wall, kicking over a chair; the Latina isn't always so violent, but this is the last straw, it really is, and "usually" doesn't apply anymore.

Who does that asshole think he is, anyways? Her hands are shaking hard, tremors that she was usually able to hide, usually WANTED to hide because she knew that Angel and Mark and Collins, Maureen and Joanne and – damn her for thinking either of their names- Benny and Roger, they would all see it and give her that LOOK. The look that told her that she was young and stupid, that she was wrong and she should be doing what they all suggest, what they're pushing her towards.

The thing is, Mimi doesn't think she was a problem. They all think so, everyone _else_ in the world thinks so, even her dealer, and she often felt that her relationship with her dealer was a more intimate one than she'd ever experienced with the other men in her life, her Benny and her Roger. But she knows it's not a problem. She's in control- no, she's not, who is she kidding- but it doesn't matter, does it? Who cares if she's in control if this is what she wants, anyways? Why is everyone making her into some fucked up little junkie whore, making her the antagonist in their bohemian storybook lives?

Her shaking hands angrily twist the cap off of her cheap bottle of liquor. She doesn't bother obtaining a glass to pour the amber liquid into- hell, she'd break it if she did, shatter it on the floor and howl even louder in outright frustration because later when she wasn't trembling so badly she'd have to pick up every shard, every fucking shard ever-so-carefully because she doesn't want to get cut and she doesn't want her infected blood everywhere, making people nervous- and instead she lifts the bottle by the neck to her lips and drinks directly from it, not caring that she's spilled some of it down her face.

It's just like the tears already streaking it, warm and wet, but later the alcohol is going to make her face sticky as opposed to the red, raw feeling of old tears. Oh fucking well. She wasn't about to try dealing with it now.

The buzz that she gets isn't what she wants, nor is it coming on quickly enough- either it's not enough alcohol or the fact that she had bought a shitty brand because it was cheap at the time. She's restless, body shaking, especially her hands, and her feet are tapping as though she's impatient for something.

Roger. That washed up guitarist upstairs, he's invaded her mind, taking up too much space. She wants to tell him that he's unwelcome, that he needs to get his ass out before one of them gets hurt or maybe even both. His mane-like dirty blonde hair surrounding his face, green eyes that practically glowed in the darkness of his dim apartment the first time she'd gone up to see him with her unlit candle… Perhaps she had been the one to come onto him, but he should have known. She thinks this even though she knows it's impossible, he couldn't have known because he hadn't even been aware she existed let alone what was wrong with her, what was screwed up in her head.

Mimi thought, she always had, that the best way to get out of one relationship is to jump into another, pursue another until it's a reality and you can forget about the last guy. Thus, Roger.

She wants to forget the past guys. She doesn't want the cheesy, badly-rhyming lines of poetry to float through her head and she doesn't want to hear those sweet nothings in her ears again months and years later, angry and crying and halfway to drunk, dying for a hit.

She doesn't want Benny to come to mind the second she smells trouble in the paradise she's created in her mind for Roger and herself. He was married and she didn't need him anymore, didn't want to hurt him or his poor unsuspecting wife- yes, she was the bitchiest woman Mimi had ever met, but Allison was faithful and the least she deserved was a husband that returned the favor. She wasn't, hadn't ever been, in love with the sellout who abandoned his friends in one of the worst parts of the city while Roger was still sick with his withdrawal.

So why? Benny was a persuasive man, something all of the bohemians knew and despised about him, and Mimi was vulnerable. Only nineteen and alone in the city of sin, or one of them. She had the clothes she was wearing, the fifty bucks she'd saved in her pocket, and her innocent good looks. _Innocent? Well, not for long…_ It seemed like a blessing when Benny picked her up off the street and got her a room in a nice hotel, got her back on her feet after being kicked out of her own home for "not contributing". He promised to love her, told her about how shitty his life had been before he came into big money- and she hadn't found out, not until later, that that money came from his new bride.

Even after she found the strength to move on, get a job at the Cat Scratch selling her body to unsatisfied men of all ages, Benny would have been able to drop back into her life at any time he wanted. She was bitterly aware of his power over her. Another sloppy gulp of liquor burned down her throat and trickled down her chin, not that she cared to wipe it away. And of course, Roger- Roger Roger Roger, her mind ranted- he had to go and tell her that Benny was one of his old friends, that ASSHOLE. Benny had found her again, and she could see it in his eyes that he wanted her back.

And he _would_ have her.

It was too much. Raw, painful emotions and memories made her bod too hot and too cold at the same time, made her itchy and uncomfortable in her own skin. Or maybe it was the hit she hadn't had in the last twelve hours, just to please Roger. But screw Roger. FUCK Roger. She stumbled off to her room, tugging off her belt and kicking her shoes into some unidentified corner as she went. Too many clothes, and she was shaking and sweating, and deep inside it HURT as though she was being stabbed with tiny sharp needles in every muscle of her body, knives sinking into her bones and twisting in her brain.

Mimi thinks about how Benny loved to manipulate her just because he could, and how he'd seized the chance to throw her on his desk and take her only because he knew that it would come out, Roger would know, they would be ruined… She can barely hold the spoon full of powder, the powder stashed away in her top dresser drawer, steady as she flicks her lighter to life beneath it, melting melting…

It's always harder to go through the motions when she's upset, and her mind is whirring at tom speed as she prepares the syringe.

Mimi thinks about how disappointed Angel would be if she was still alive, even though she'd always been the most understanding of her friend's "habit". She saw the drag queen's concerned face in her mind, as clearly as if she hadn't already died, as if she'd seen her only a moment ago. It morphs into Benny's triumphant smirk and the anger-hate-rage-pain on Roger's face as he yelled at her, telling her that he's leaving, trying to disguise the fact that he's crying and his eyeliner is smudging and he must really care because Roger never shows that much emotion, Roger doesn't cry.

Her belt tied tightly around her bicep, cutting off the circulation for a moment so that she could locate a blue vein beneath her mocha skin, Mimi desperately tries to erase the next face that pops up, Mark's- he's almost as distressed as the fighting couple, biting his lip so hard it bleeds and twisting his hands together. Mark doesn't think that anyone knows that he loves Roger in ways that he shouldn't, but Mimi could see it from day one when she caught him staring after Roger as they walked away hand in hand. She could see it in his expressive blue eyes behind the thick frames of his glasses- here was another girl to take Roger away from him. And he might be in pain and he might be jealous, but there was nothing he could do. And then he went diving right back into his work with a fervor born of a life of frustration.

He probably hated her for putting Roger through all of this shit; after all, Mark never screamed at Roger or slept with someone that he hated. No, Mark was only a good friend, a BEST friend, who paid the rent and made sure that Roger took his meds every god damned day. Mimi was a stripper. Mimi was a whore. Mimi was a dirty cheater. Mimi needed a hit, she needed her heroin.

The needle slid smoothly into her skin, and she frowned as she pushed the plunger down, flooding her veins with liquid life, filling her with bliss…

Mimi wasn't sure when those thoughts had become hers, not the rest of the world's, and she was ashamed to admit that they were all true.

But then everything feels good again and Mimi doesn't have to think anymore.


End file.
